Citation

Strayer DL, Johnston WA. Psychol. Sci. 2001; 12(6): 462-466.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, University of Utah, Salt Lake City 84112-0251, USA. strayer@psych.utah.edu

Copyright

(Copyright © 2001, Association for Psychological Science, Publisher John Wiley and Sons)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

11760132

Abstract

Dual-task studies assessed the effects of cellular-phone conversations on performance of a simulated driving task. Performance was not disrupted by listening to radio broadcasts or listening to a book on tape. Nor was it disrupted by a continuous shadowing task using a handheld phone, ruling out, in this case, dual-task interpretations associated with holding the phone, listening, or speaking, However significant interference was observed in a word-generation variant of the shadowing task, and this deficit increased with the difficulty of driving. Moreover unconstrained conversations using either a handheld or a hands-free cell phone resulted in a twofold increase in the failure to detect simulated traffic signals and slower reactions to those signals that were detected. We suggest that cellular-phone use disrupts performance by diverting attention to an engaging cognitive context other than the one immediately associated with driving.


Keywords: Driver distraction;

Language: en